Dawn of Cobalt Shadows (Burning Empire Book 2) by Emma Hamm (best e ink reader for manga .txt) 📕

something, anything. The words didn’t want to come out, and they didn’t have to. His mind suddenly shook with the weight of another launching deep through his skull.

The pain spread through the back of his head until he couldn’t think of anything else other than the words screaming inside his skull.

“Nadir!”

He’d waited so long to hear that voice. He didn’t want to hear it ring with anger or disappointment as it was now, but he’d take whatever he could with her. If she wanted to shout at him, to fight, it was still something. Anything was better than the near year of silence.

“She’s here,” he muttered, standing swiftly and casting a glance at the woman who had birthed him. “I take it you’ll lead the ceremony?”

“She would have wanted her own blood to lead that.”

He was already striding toward the front of the hut. He paused beside Tahira and clapped a hand to her shoulder. “You’re more her family than I am. If she wanted someone who cared for her to help guide her into whatever afterlife you believe in, then you would be better at that than I.”

The emotion in her gaze nearly sent him to his knees. He didn’t want to see the pain in those eyes. She was a strong woman, a warrior who had managed to break free from the Bymerian prisons. She shouldn’t have to suffer like this when there were so many more who deserved it.

No words came to mind. Instead, Nadir nodded one more time and left the hut. The Alqatara would take care of each other, he was certain of that. There was no reason for him to be there.

Sand blasted up as he strode through the huts. Sigrid wouldn’t land here. She didn’t like people to see her in the dragon form. Perhaps a bit of her mind rattled along their connection as well. He knew she was angry, nervous, and so tentative to come here after what she’d done.

He felt the same. The Bymerian people were so close to liking her. They wanted to see something in her like a future that they could understand. Then, she’d taken that all away by destroying their capital city.

He should be angrier about that too. He should hate her for what she had done, and all the things she stood for.

And yet… he couldn’t. Nadir still felt as though she was the only person in the empire who could understand him. The only one who could look into his eyes and know what he felt.

Did she feel the same?

Somewhere between the hut where his mother’s body lay and the outskirts of the Alqatara village, he began to run. His lungs nearly burst with the effort, his muscles burning as he raced toward her. The pain didn’t matter. Physical pain was fleeting.

Some of the assassins stared at him as he raced by. They were merely lucky he didn't change into the dragon and let the beast take over for a few moments. Gods knew it was screaming in his head, begging to be released so that it could race to the side of their mate. It knew she was here. It knew they were mere heartbeats away from seeing her again. After all this time.

The gates to Falldell stood open. They remained so during the day in case any stragglers through the sands needed help. So few did, but the great snake heads stared out into the desert, waiting for someone.

This time, he knew they were waiting for the same person he was. He ran like a dying man toward the everlasting oasis. His soul would find her, he knew it. Anywhere she went, he could feel her.

Sand stirred on the horizon and a massive head lifted from the dunes. Opalescent and shimmering in the sunlight, she stood strong and proud. There were two figures next to her, but he didn’t care who they were. They could be here to kill him for all he knew. It didn’t matter.

She was so close.

Nadir slowed as he approached, stopping ten paces away from her and watching as the scales melted away. She changed back into the woman he knew, and yet… someone so much more than that.

Her hair was longer, he realized. It had been bleached by the sun into a white gold that hurt his eyes to look at. She no longer wore it braided or twisted back from her face, but free hanging nearly to her waist now.

Icy eyes stared at him with an anger that he felt deep in his soul, but a sadness that he didn’t understand. Her face had thinned as well. The square jaw he’d so admired many times was more pronounced. The curved edges of her cheeks, so childlike when he first saw her, had hardened into a more aggressive face.

The mantle on her shoulders was made of fur. Leather armor covered her chest and what looked like a loincloth parted at the sides of her legs to reveal long lines of alabaster skin.

He’d never seen so much of her at once. It was overwhelming.

A smear of dirt marred her cheek, and he couldn’t help but look at it with fondness. She’d never cared very much for what she looked like. Even the elaborate gowns she wore were always ruined by the end of the day. He’d tried to get her to dress in the ways of his people, thinking she’d do less harm to silks if they were even more delicate. Now, he could see that was always a losing battle.

Sigrid was a woman made of wild abandon and a desire to hear the wind in her ears. She couldn’t be tamed by castle walls. He’d been a fool to even try.

Taking one step forward, he reached out a hand and said a single word. “Wife.”

Something snapped between them. He didn’t know if he was the first one to move or her. But within a heartbeat she was in his arms, and it felt so right.

The earth stopped